5G may be a ‘hard sell’ to consumers initially: GSMA

5G technology could be challenging for telecom carriers to sell to consumers at the onset while the fourth generation (4G) technology would continue to be a mainstay for at least a decade, a GSMA executive said.Muntazir Abbas | ETTelecom | Updated: February 08, 2019, 14:45 IST

NEW DELHI: The newer fifth generation or 5G technology could be challenging for telecom carriers to sell to consumers at the onset while the fourth generation (4G) technology would continue to be a mainstay for at least a decade, a GSMA executive said.

“The 5G consumer business would be a hard sell initially for operators,” GSMA India policy director Manoj Misra said, adding that consumers would continue to pay bills for 4G/LTE for at least next 10 years.

The London-based group’s executive said that as many as 80 operators in 50 markets have embarked on 5G trials.

GSMA Intelligence, in its finding, expects global 5G consumer mobile connections would reach 1.36 billion, accounting for 14% by 2025, while 4G connections would account for 53% by that time.

During this period, telcos, according to the top telecom group, would also be investing in deploying new 5G networks.

Misra said that 5G will bring massive transformation, and anticipates India to have 1.1 billion smartphone connections by 2025.

The newer technology is expected to bring in new revenue stream for service providers with relevant use cases in the enterprise sector across agriculture, automotive, healthcare, education and transportation verticals.

Jio’s executive also said that 40% to 50% of the 4G-LTE spectrum is unutilised worldwide while Indian operators’ capacity has reached to almost 98%.

“There are huge gaps in the specification of 5G small cells while backhaul is the key to it,” Jamadagni said, adding that enabling easy end-to-end orchestration could ensure the success of SDN/NFV.

“India has 5G trial plans similar to that of European counterparts. There is also an opportunity in sub 1GHz band,” department of telecom (DoT) DDG (Policy) Kishore Babu said.

The official said that there would be a lot of opportunity in the country with 330 million households having only 20 million broadband connections.

“The National Digital Communications Policy (NDCP) aims to propel India to be among top 50 nations in ICT development index of ITU,” Babu added.

The country has been ranked at 134th position in 2017.

“5G is a collaborative project with industry, academia, and 5G Forum has already given its recommendations with most of them are now a part of national policy objectives,” DoT DDG (International Cooperation) RK Pathak said.

The official feels that globally harmonised standards would be very important as the country would soon board the 5G bandwagon.

“5G will need to become a globally harmonised standard before it can be rolled out at a large scale,” Jean-Pierre Bienaime, secretary general, 5GIA said.

The 5G pan-EU trials, according to him, are being implemented with a global context with countries where deployment is underway.

The group’s executive said that the phase-II of the 5G research is underway with a focus on applications to verticals, while the next phase, according to him would include large scale trails and validation

“The European Union (EU) expects at least one city in member nations would become 5G-enabled while by 2025,” Tonnie De Koster, advisor (International Outreach) for Digital Single Market at the European Commission said.

The urban areas in the region, according to him, are expected to move to the newer technology platform by 2025.

Koster was speaking at the India-EU Stakeholders’ workshop organised by TSDSI, 5GIA and the Broadband India Forum (BIF).

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After PSU banks, the government is likely to infuse capital in two chronically ill telecom PSUs BSNL and MTNL, and the Union Cabinet is likely to take a decision on 4G spectrum allocation to them by the third week of the current month after DoT places the note before it for consideration.

At a high-level meeting at the PMO late Tuesday, it was also decided that the two telcos will frame a Voluntary Retirement Scheme (VRS) to reduce their employee strength, which will be followed by a reduction in the retirement age to 58.